The Collectorvision System: A Niche Game Console w/ Potential for Success or Disaster?

Recently Collectorvision Games showed off some work in progress art for an interesting system they have in development called The CollectorVision System. According to CV’s instagram page the system will be FPGA based (such as the Super NT) and will be able to play Colecovision, MSX and Sega Master System games via cart slot/SD cards in Full HD on your modern television.

Wow! This is something niche collectors like myself have been waiting for! I personally love Colecovision and Master System so this would be incredible. The WIP design looks great, it’s reminiscent of a Colecovision but also has a vcr / tape recorder look that’s very similar of electronics of the time period.

Now that we pointed at the positives, let’s play devils advocate… Collectorvision is responsible for the highly anticipated game Sydney Hunter a throwback platformer that boasted nice graphics and good gameplay for a plethora of retro systems. The game is out now for SNES and has mixed reviews in the community, the game is buggy and has many glitches and some have said it felt rushed. On top of that Collectorvision used Kickstarter to fund this game and they didn’t deliver what they promised to backers, people who pre-ordered the game from their website recieved the game before backers!

Not only did they mess up there but they also promised numbered golden carts, golden carts did come out but they weren’t numbered, like promised. You can also read the Kickstarter comment section from fans and backers tearing them apart, but the worst part Collectorvision just ignored their investers….

This display of disrespect is truly frustrating for those who backed a project they believed in. Now I’m not sure if this is related but John Lester aka Gamester81 who runs a successful YouTube channel reviewing retrogaming related products is the PR and Community Manager of CVG and was also part of the team trying to bring out the RetroVGS/Coleco Chameleon… And we all saw what a shit show that was. If John Lester does the PR and community manager he’s not doing his job as I assume those job titles means he’s the one who handles answering Kickstarter messages. So it makes me leary about this project.

In closing the system looks amazing and it’s features are more than appealing. If CVG goes the crowd funding route, I’m not sure if I’m confident in them delivering promises to their investers as they couldn’t do it with Sydney Hunter. While I’d like to have high hopes for this project, I guess I’ll wait to see what happens. What do you guys think?